Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) has claimed thousands of deaths of infants between the ages of two weeks and one year. In all cases, death occurred while the child was sleeping in the prone position, but the exact cause of death has not been conclusively identified.
However, in a recent article in JAMA (The Journal of the American Medical Association, 2006, Vol. 296, No. 17, 2124-2132), a connection was suggested between SIDS deaths and a neurological defect in the brain stem, which prevents the infant, sleeping in the prone position, from reacting normally to a lack in the supply of oxygen. A healthy infant would lift or turn its head in order to breathe. Over the last ten years, a campaign initiated by doctors, nurses and medical journals, which recommended laying the child to sleep on its back, has resulted in a significant drop in SIDS deaths.
Not all parents, however, have been willing to follow these recommendations. They fear that their child will regurgitate part of its food and will suffocate as a result. Besides, by the age of 5-6 months, infants can already turn over by themselves.
In a different approach to the problem of sleep positions, pediatricians have come to the conclusion that infants sleeping in the prone position attain several motor capabilities earlier than supine sleepers. (Pediatrics, November, 1998, Vol. 102, 1135-1140).
A lateral search of the relevant SIDS data-bank has revealed one patent dated 1999 (U.S. Pat. No. 5,857,232).